Romance of Dragons and Snakes

Huo Ling’er’s head was bowed down towards her bowl as she prodded it with her chopsticks. While she ate at a slow but composed pace, the amount of food she was eating was far beyond what any other young lady would eat at her age. Even after finishing a bowl, she would soon fill it back up with even more food. It had only been for a short while since she began to learn martial arts in earnest under Wang Chao, but she was already practicing Hidden Jin. Because of that triumph however, her appetite had become even more voracious–she was like a bottomless pit; no matter how much she ate, she was never full.

The energy consumption of a martial artist was far greater than that of a regular person. After Clear Jin was learned, each and every strike would explode with sweat; the average person would even be able to see this as a wisp of steam from their bodies. In a single movement, they would exhaust all of their strength–that was a tremendous loss of stamina as a result.

Huo Ling’er did not have to worry about growing fat or bad skin however. Already have a year had past since her beginning days with Wang Chao, and her rate of improvement had been so spectacular that in comparison to before, there was a tremendous difference. Not only was she capable of Hidden Jin, her skin was far more lustrous than before, and far more supple and sleek in appearance as well. The previously tough and bulky joints and muscles she had had already slimmed down to be like silk in appearance without weakening in physical prowess.

The vast majority of the achievements she had gained in this half year could primarily be attributed to her foundation gained from her mastery of Karate, Kendo, and Judo. Her studies in Kendo had also led to her studying the ways of Zen and meditation to help soothe her heart and paved the way to further increase her level of comprehension and understanding.

Pa! As soon as Huo Ling’er finished off another bowl and prepared herself to fill it back up, Wang Chao’s chopsticks flew out and clamped onto hers.

“Eh?” Huo Ling’er immediately grew vigilant. With a twist of her wrist, her chopsticks reversed its movements and drilled forwards with the movements of the sword to escape.

“When eating, it is best to not eat to one’s max. Eat until seventy percent and then stop to retain your appetite. That way, you will learn to cultivate your health. To eat and drink unreasonably is far more damaging to the body than to starve and thirst.” Ever since his major revelations in martial arts, Wang Chao had made sure to focus on the finer details of how to live life.

To stop after reaching seventy percent in one’s fill to experience the pleasant lingering was an ideology of how to nurture one’s health. In the past, the scholar officials would often call this ‘appreciative fasting’.

If one were to eat until one was so full that hiccups came out, then whenever a hiccup was made, the acid water and the flavor of the food would escape from the mouth. This was a very damaging aspect to the body and was far more serious than not eating at all.

There were many great experts of the art of war in the past. Perhaps it was because of the constant warfare that lived with them that forced them to pay less attention to their lifestyle. Or perhaps it was because their lifestyle was already wretched and far too busy to pay attention to how they lived. But no matter how in shape they were, they would always weaken in body by the times they reached their midlife.

On the surface, it appeared as if Wang Chao had been the dominant victor in his match against Zhou Binglin. But in truth, it had been a match where both sides suffered serious wounds. One suffered an external wound, the other suffered an internal wound. That match had also been his crowning moment where fame and revelations came to him at once. His comprehension had deepened tremendously. Even more importantly was the fact that Wang Chao felt the utmost respect for Zhou Binglin after realizing that even at the age of his mid fifties, his physical strength was still the same as if he was at his time of youth.

The simplistic movements from martial arts had been used in cohesion. The chop, the grab, the simple horse stance, every day, they were practiced by Wang Chao without fail. This way the cultivation of his health had been affected in every manner. From eating, to sleeping, each aspect had been meticulously refined upon so he could constantly safeguard his strength and be full with strength rather than food.

“Hehe, fine fine.” Huo Ling’er gave a half smile in response while nodding. But even while smiling, her wrist made a sudden movement to fly towards and grab onto a piece of fish.

Smiling as well, Wang Chao’s finger gave a sudden twitched before moving again to obstruct the chopsticks of his disciples with his own.

There was a subtle twist of Huo Ling’er’s wrist once more as she made use of the “White Ape Offers Fruit” to move forward. Combining it into the sheathing method of “Reverse Grip Sheathing” to bring the fish back into her bowl.

In the battle of chopsticks between master and disciple, their movements had been uncanny in accuracy and control. Aside from their wrist and knuckles, no other part of their body had moved.

When Huo Ling’er fought with the chopstick as her sword, her style had been similar to a ‘phoenix flying gracefully through the air while returning with the swift coiling of a snake’. In an impeccable fusion of Kendo, the sword art of Xingyiquan and Wudang, she had achieved a miraculous level of skill.

But Wang Chao had some skill to him as well in this aspect. With a streak of his chopsticks in a similar movement to that of a silk cloth, he had performed the “Hanging Sword”.

With a crack, Huo Ling’er’s chopstick had snapped into four pieces.

“Master, how did you do that?” Huo Ling’er had been startled as she stared blankly at the broken fragments of her eating utensil. “Master, is your ability with the sword so strong that you could injure a person without injuring the grass in front of him? Is that the very same ability where one could use their internal energy to make the leaf of a flower so sharp that it could slice through stone?”

“Using a leaf to slice through stone? That’s merely a false concept in Wuxia novels.” Wang Chao cracked the knuckles on his arms to alleviate the pressure in it. “When I snapped your chopsticks, it was because of the strength in your wrist and knuckles. If you were a regular person, then I would only be able to disarm them instead of breaking it. You have strength, I have strength, but the chopsticks themselves do not have strength.”

“That’s enough for now. Let us take a joke. You should pack up later tonight. Tomorrow morning we set out for the Southwest Infantry School. I’ll be working there for a few months as a military instructor for jungle and close combat training. With the experts there, it’ll do you well in combat experience, so I’ll be taking you with me.”

It was actually just yesterday that Wang Chao had heard from Cao Yi about his assignment to the Southwest Infantry School. After giving it some thought when he came back home, he realized that it would be beneficial to take Huo Ling’er with him. With one more phone call to Cao Yi, Wang Chao had been given permission quickly.

“I was able to dodge the bullets of a single person, but that was only a single concentrated attack. There are many people within the jungle–an area I am not familiar with–I wonder just how well I’ll manage in such a place?”

Wang Chao had been very curious to find out the answer to this thought. Similarly, it was also the best method of training in his mind. In a battle between men in a match of martial arts, there was no challenge; but every martial artist’s biggest challenge was how they would fair against guns.

The Southwest Infantry School was a military institute which was geographically located within a city to the southwest. They would pick the soldiers with the highest aptitude to learn jungle warfare and close combat. There was other specializations such as sniping and cold weaponry such as crossbows. Boulder, Hammer, and the other soldiers who were in charge of protecting Wang Chao for example came from this very school.

No matter whom the leader was, they would hope for soldiers like them to be their bodyguards. With the fact that each and every nation was connected to each other and nuclear weapons were now the new standard, large-scale warfare with the usage of the military had been significantly reduced to become almost nothing. In this new era, espionage, assassination, kidnapping, stealing classified information, hacking, spying, hiding, and many other specializations where the abilities of a single soldier was emphasized had become the more important aspect rather than the ability of an entire army.

If, for example, one nation were to have some sort of conflict with a neighboring nation, one of the nations could have a small squadron of soldiers infiltrate the other and kidnap and execute the leading figures and officials. This was known as cutting the head off of the snake, a very decisive and ideal situation above all else. If tanks, cannons, fighter jets, warships, artillery, or other weapons were used, then it would become a war of encroachment. All of a sudden, this conflict would become something drastically different and sink both nations into a political and economical quagmire where the gains did not make up for the losses.

So in response to the new structure of globalized warfare, martial artists such as Wang Chao had been highly regarded and cultivated so that they in turn could help shape up the soldiers of tomorrow.

Although martial arts was in decline, they were slowly thriving under the combination of martial arts and the utilization of hot weaponry.

Think about it. If there were three or five hundred experts like Cheng Shanming or Wang Chao as a well disciplined unit, then they would be able to execute any important mission. Even the kidnapping of the president of the United States would not be a problem for them.

Artillery loaded fighters for example was an investment of high proportions. With each artillery strike, money was thrown away. With each ammunition made, another few millions was planned for the next production. Who knows just how many talented soldiers could have been produced with such a sum?

In some times, the life of a human was worth their weight in gold. In other times, they were nothing more than cannon fodder. Such was the wonders of life.

And so the Southwest Infantry School was created with this model in mind.

Although it was a military school within the military, it wasn’t inferior in comparison to the institutes of higher education within the mainlands. With each term, there were thousands of students with just as many teachers. Male and female soldiers were gathered there to learn for a short year before being issued elsewhere, but the training regime here was sharp and the competition was cutthroat.

Whoosh! A single green bolt came flying out from a bush low on the ground towards a tree above. With a cracking sound, the bolt had embedded itself deeply into a completely green triangular-headed snake that was slithering down the tree to prey on the smoking soldier beneath.

The smoking soldier had made no movements other than to throw away the cigarette he had been smoking to the ground. Looking up at the dead snake, he muttered to himself, “Strange, it’s not March yet, why is there a snake? Is global warming changing the hibernation schedule of the snakes?”

“As long as there is enough food, some animals won’t go into hibernation.” A crackling sound could be heard in the bushes before a young soldier with camo paint on his face could be seen holding a military crossbow. “Goddamn it, Liu Qing, you’re smoking in a military drill? If I aimed just slightly lower, then your head would have a new hole in it! You didn’t even notice the snake above your head, did you just completely abandon all of your previous training man?”

“I already knew that you were hidden over there, Gao Jun. You might not have known this, but while you were shooting at the snake I was already aware of, I had three different opportunities to shoot you straight through your head.”

The one named Liu Qing had a smile that didn’t quite reach his eyes, “You on the other hand, your ambush skills got worse. How was it? Did protecting the senior officials in Beijing go straight to your head or something?”

“Bah, aren’t you two full of yourselves! We’ve been hiding here for so long already and could have killed you both a hundred times over, Gao Jun, Liu Qing.”

From twenty meters away, another two youths came flying out with a movement similar to a monkey.

“Zhang Kai, Fang Wei! You’ve gotten better with hiding yourselves. Seems like you two went through a lot at the boundaries with India.” Liu Qing remarked with a slightly unwell face.

“You’ve gone soft, Liu Qing. Did you even do anything during your stay with the Beijing Central? Gai Jun, did you bite the frost-covered bullet of Capitalism during your mission in Europe? No matter how much I look at you, I can see that disgusting yuppie tone to you, why is that? And why is it that I heard you were boning the princess to the royal family of the UK?”

Zhang Kai, Fang Wei, Gao Jun and Liu Qing. All four of them were famed experts within the military. For years, they’ve worked with the entire military, National Security, Ministry of Public Security, and the armed police and participated within their aptitude test to score second, third, fourth, and fifth. Although there were still plenty of hidden figures that didn’t participate, they were still considered one of the best amongst the soldiers.

“Okay, let’s cut the chit-chat. It’s been a long time since we last met. We’re here today to test our strength and get back that spirit from a long time ago.” Liu Qing sighed. He was the second place winner of the all-military comprehensive competition. Because the Shaolin monk Duan Guochao had captured him during the jungle warfare had managed to capture him, he fell down a rank. But he wasn’t too bad in aptitude. It was only because Duan Guochao was better than him in martial arts that he was second to him.

“Aye, the four of us are already on our way towards our thirties. I just simply can’t understand why with our experience, aptitude, and logic, we were sent back to this school. No matter how special of a military instructor we’re being given, what is the meaning of the higher ups by this assignment? It’s absolutely disgusting for us to pretend to be students.”

“In my personal opinion, there isn’t anyone that could have the qualifications to be my military instructor!” Zhang Kai and Fang Wei both piped up in unison.

“Don’t get too ahead of yourselves you three. There’s still plenty of people who could teach us a thing or two. The elder Li in Beijing for example!” Liu Qing fished out another cigarette.

“While elder Li does have the right, he’s already ninety something years old. Compared to before, his strength has atrophied. It won’t take another few years before he joins the others in Mt. Babao. In his earlier years, he could definitely teach us, but it’s unfortunate we lost that chance to learn something more from him to Duan Guochao.” Liu Qing sighed.

“You probably don’t know this, but Duan Guochao is already dead. He died in a fight against another expert.” As a guard in Beijing, Gao Jun had been very knowledgeable about that fact.

“Which expert?” Liu Qing asked in interest.

“He’s someone from the Military Commission. A new guy who’s pretty strong. Even the military instructors in Beijing lost against him. More importantly, the “Little War God” Zhou Binglin had lost an arm to him. Even the Nak Muay from Thailand was killed by his hand just recently.

Liu Qing narrowed his eyes, “Are you talking about the Nak Muay Nguyễn Hồng Tú? I heard some people from the English Hongmen Society talk about that match. His opponent was called Wang Chao, wasn’t he? A martial artist whose crocodile stance of Xingyiquan has reached perfection and earned him the nickname of the “Crocodile Immortal”? Is he the one that killed Duan Guochao? How old is he? Is he the one that’ll be our military instructor?”

There would be no way that Wang Chao would know that his name would precede him after his match with Nguyễn Hồng Tú. There was an even smaller chance that he would think the overseas world of martial arts would give him another nickname.

Author’s note: How does everyone like this nickname of Wang Chao? Martial arts, Go, and anything else, everyone has a nickname. The South Korean Go player Lee Chang-ho was known as the Stone Buddha. Xu Yinchuan the Chinese Chess grandmaster was called the young Jiang Ziya. Sun Lu-tang was known as the Tiger Head Hero and First Hand Under the Sky. Shang Yunxiang was the Iron Feet Buddha. If any of my readers have any suggestions for Wang Chao’s nickname, then please suggest them and I’ll change it if it’s suitable.